The first good batch of cucumbers to come off the vines this year my Mother laid claim to for sour pickles. It seems the Atkins company has either gone out of business or our store is no longer carrying them, either way she can't get her hands on good sour pickles any more.

So after brining them for a week in a pickling crock she's had since I was a baby, she had planned to can them today. She's never used a BWB canner (when she was a kid my grandmother used the Hot Pack method which I promptly talked my mother out of) and the last time she made these 20 some-odd years ago she used a pressure canner.

So Mom was asking me about processing times, how much water to use...etc. ect. until finally she asked if I wouldn't mind canning them for her. LOL!

I feel like I've been drafted by Nixon LOL! Somehow I've gone from "advisor" status to the front lines .

So I hooked the garden hose to the kitchen faucet, loaded the jars in the canner, filled it up and am waiting for it to come to a boil. Once that's done I'll make up the vinegar and spice solution, pack them and can them for her

To fill the canner. Hey! It works and you don't have to haul pan after pan of water from the sink to the stove. I just hooked the adapter from an old waterbed fill kit to the faucet, turn on the water and fill 'er up. BUT!! For purposes of sterilization I never let the end of the hose touch the water in the canner.

I also stick my clean jars into my dry canner, let the rack down then fill the jars first then let the canner fill on up. That way the jars don't float on me when I load them.

Oh funny thing about Mom's pickles, when I pulled them out of the canner yesterday they were as cloudy as they could be. I was looking at them somewhat perplexed and asked her "Did you use canning salt?" My mother looked shocked for a second and went "OH Me! No I didn't". When the recicpe called for her to soak them in 1/2 cup salt she just grabbed the Mortons off the shelf without a second thought

Oh well, it won't affect the taste heee hee.

~ Raven ~

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